


Old Sins Cast Long Shadows

by imsorryimlate



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Police, Emotional Constipation, Friends to Lovers, Injury Recovery, Kidnapping, M/M, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Minor Character Death, Unresolved Emotional Tension, anakin needs to chill or go to anger management, gruesome details, obi-wan is worried (with every right to be), questionable police work
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-01-02
Updated: 2016-02-10
Packaged: 2018-03-05 00:28:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 11,168
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3098207
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/imsorryimlate/pseuds/imsorryimlate
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Detectives Kenobi and Skywalker are not only partners, but also best friends. Things change when Obi-Wan gets kidnapped.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I first got this idea after seeing dyingsighs' [adorable doodle](http://dyingsighs.tumblr.com/post/100399938424/anakin-obi-wan-true-detective-au-doodle) of Anakin and Obi-Wan, and after spending a lot of time watching both Criminal Minds and True Detective, I just had to get this out of my system before I continue writing my other fanfics.  
> Important thing to note: I don't live in the U.S and therefore don't know exactly how things work over there, especially not the details of police work. As previously stated, CM and TD are my inspirations for this, and those are fictional tv-shows.  
> Enjoy!

Obi-Wan woke up by the sound of his phone vibrating on the bedside table. With one ear still pressed against the pillow, he answered the call.

“Kenobi,” he mumbled into the phone, in case it was the station phoning him. It wasn’t.

“Hey, it’s me,” Anakin answered. Of course, who else would be calling at two thirty in the morning?

“Hey, what’s up?” Obi-Wan tried to rub the sleep out of his eyes.

“I’m outside, can I crash?” That’s when he heard the slight slur in his partner’s voice. Anakin was drunk.

“You have a key for a reason, Anakin.” That reason being so that Anakin wouldn’t have to wake him up every time he wanted to crash.

“I know, but I left my keychain at the station.”

“Alright, I’m buzzing you up.” Obi-Wan left his warm bed and put on a robe before going to the hall and buzzing open the door to the building. He heard Anakin steps coming up the stairs. It didn’t even take a minute before there was a knock on his door.

“It’s dark in here,” Anakin commented when he stepped inside. Obi-Wan hadn’t bothered to turn on the lights.

“Yeah, I was sleeping,” Obi-Wan said.

“Sorry that I woke you.” Anakin took off his shoes and his long, black coat.

“It’s fine.” Obi-Wan gripped Anakin’s arm steadily and led him towards the kitchen. He wasn’t sure how much Anakin had drunk, but he always insisted that drinking a glass of water before going to sleep would ease the hangover. It was a trick passed down to him by his former partner, Qui-Gon Jinn.

He pushed Anakin into a kitchen chair while he retrieved a glass from the cupboard and cold water from the fridge. Anakin was sitting with his face in his palms, probably already feeling a headache coming on. Obi-Wan patted his shoulder before handing him the glass. Anakin drank it obediently, but didn’t seem to enjoy it very much. Obi-Wan leaned against the counter and watched him idly. The room was dark, but his night vision was good enough to let him see the details of his partner’s face.

“You are always welcome to crash here when you are drunk, but next time I would appreciate if you asked me to join you first.” Obi-Wan hoped he sounded as lighthearted as he was aiming for. He didn’t have any problem with Anakin going out drinking with others and Anakin knew that. It’s just that they usually went out together. It had always been that way. Hell, he’d been the one to buy Anakin his first drink. And even when they didn’t go out together, Anakin at least asked.

“I would’ve, but you’d already gone home. I thought I’d make the new girl feel welcomed to the force,” Anakin explained.

“Ah, the new girl.”

“Ahsoka, yeah. She’s nice, got the right spirit.” Anakin’s lips turned up into a small smile.

“You taking her under your wing?” Obi-Wan asked. When he was new on the job, Qui-Gon had taken him under his wing. When Anakin was new on the job, Obi-Wan took him under his wing and taught him everything he knew. Maybe this Ahsoka would be Anakin’s protégée, and in a decade or two they would be partners, like Anakin and Obi-Wan were now.

“I don’t know, maybe.” Anakin shrugged.

“I guess you’re off the hook then. Come on, I’ll make the couch for you.”

Obi-Wan had known Anakin since the other man was ten years old. He’d slept over at Obi-Wan’s place a hundred times. When he was younger, they shared Obi-Wan’s bed. It wasn’t a big deal. But when Anakin grew older, it suddenly seemed very important that he slept on the couch. Obi-Wan knew that Anakin didn’t like it, but they never spoke of it. There was much between them that they never spoke of.

 

* * *

 

Anakin woke up by the alarm on his phone blaring from his coat pocket in the hall. He rushed up to turn it off. He hated that sound, but it was sure to get him to wake up.

He walked around in the now lit-up apartment, looking for Obi-Wan in every room. His partner was in none of them, so he’d probably already left for work. Anakin didn’t feel motivated to go to work today; he’d rather stay here and watch movies on Obi-Wan’s big-screen television and recover from last night’s drinking. Instead, he hopped into the shower, ate some of Obi-Wan’s cereal (it tasted like shit, had probably expired months ago) and got dressed. He had spare clothes at Obi-Wan’s place, so he thankfully didn’t have to arrive at the station in the same clothes as yesterday and make everyone believe he’d gotten laid. Not that it was a bad thing to get laid, but he wasn’t comfortable with people thinking he slept around. People had a tendency to judge.

When he arrived at the station, he immediately went to his desk. Ah, there they were; his keys. He’d been ninety-nine percent certain that he’d left them there the day before, but one could never know for sure. After he’d slung his coat over his chair, he ventured towards the kitchen. He found Ahsoka there, sipping coffee and looking like she’s been run over by a hoard of elephants multiple times.

“Hey Snips, rough night?” Anakin asked, the nickname rolling off his tongue easier than expected. She eyed him; first annoyed, then amused.

“Yeah, some dude convinced me to celebrate the first day on the job by drinking,” she answered.

“Sounds like a birdbrain,” Anakin said and took out two mugs, filling them with coffee.

“Definitely.”

Anakin left the kitchen and went searching for Obi-Wan. His partner had a habit of disappearing and making Anakin chase after him. Apparently Anakin did the same thing, because Obi-Wan complained about it sometimes.

“Your hubby is in evidence, Skywalker,” Officer Fisto said when he passed him in the hallway, probably recognizing his searching look.

“Thanks, man,” Anakin said and steered his feet towards the evidence room. And correct, Obi-Wan was searching through a box of evidence. Anakin recognized the box; they had searched through it at least a dozen times. This could only mean one thing; Obi-Wan had had a break-through in their case.

“Oh, there you are,” Obi-Wan said when he entered. He took the mug of coffee Anakin handed him. “How was the bus?”

“Noisy and dirty, as usual,” Anakin said and they stood there, sipping their coffee for a moment. “What did you find?” He asked eventually.

“Remember that woman we brought in the other day?” Obi-Wan asked.

“The hop-head that was talking out of her ass?” Anakin remembered her; hadn’t made one bit of sense.

“Precisely, that one. She was rambling on and on about following the moon to the stars.” Obi-Wan put down his coffee and started digging through the box again.

“And that’s relevant because?”

“Because I suddenly remembered something about that crack house we busted a couple of weeks ago,” he said. Anakin sighed.

“We’ve looked through that box a hundred times, Obi-Wan. There’s nothing that will lead us to Sidious.” They had been trying to find Sidious and his band of criminals for almost a year. They were responsible for at least two thirds of the drugs in the state, but despite that no one knew where he was or where the production took place.

“Well, we haven’t looked at the photos of the crime scene since we talked to that woman,” Obi-Wan said and took out a handful of photographs from the box. He flipped through them rapidly.

“Here,” he said and held the photo in front of Anakin. “Do you see it?”

“No,” Anakin said after giving the photo a quick look.

“There,” Obi-Wan said and pointed. In the corner, barely visible, the photographer had caught a piece of the doorframe. And on that doorframe, someone had carved a half-circle.

“A half-circle. A crescent moon,” Anakin filled in for himself.

“And if ‘stars’ is the slang for the drugs…” Obi-Wan trailed off. They both knew that they were scraping at the bottom of the bottle of leads and were desperate. But how many times had unlikely leads led them to the solution? How many times had Obi-Wan encouraged him to think outside of the box and consider all possibilities?

“It’s a long shot, but it’s the best one we’ve got. Let’s go back and check it out,” Anakin said and drained his coffee in one swig.

 

* * *

 

Obi-Wan let Anakin drive. He had been the one to teach Anakin to drive, but their driving styles differed quite much. The younger man was sometimes reckless in traffic, despite of Obi-Wan’s constant backseat driving. Anakin always complained that Obi-Wan drove too slow and too correct. He seemed to believe the traffic laws were guidelines rather than rules.

“Anakin, slow down,” he said, but didn’t bother with the stern tone. He knew that his partner would ignore him, but he always said it just in case Anakin decided to start driving properly one day.

They arrived at the crack house after forty-five minutes instead of the usual hour. Obi-Wan glared at Anakin.

“What?” He asked.

“You know the statistics for automobile accidents. I won’t repeat them,” Obi-Wan answered.

“Come on, old man, live a little,” Anakin said with a smile.

“I won’t be able to live if I’m dead because you couldn’t keep the speed limit.”

Their constant bickering was one of the finer things in life. Sometimes it bordered on heated arguments, sometimes it was indistinguishable from flirting, but it was always there. It had the other cops rolling their eyes at them and calling them an old married couple.

“Let’s just get in that house,” Anakin said and stepped out of the car. Obi-Wan followed suit.

Last time they’d been here they had busted the place. It’d been filled with druggies shooting up, sniffing and swallowing various pills, but now there was only the lonely owner of the house left. Whoring out his house as a safe haven for everyone looking to get fucked up was supposedly his only way of getting company. Obi-Wan and Anakin didn’t wear uniforms, but the man recognized them immediately.

“If you want to search the house again, get a warrant,” he said through the door that was kept ajar by a chain. It must’ve been new, since they broke the last when they kicked in the door.

“We only want to talk,” Anakin said.

“Then talk. I ain’t getting out there,” he said.

“We know about the stars, Steve,” Obi-Wan tried. The man’s eyes widened.

“No, they assured me– “

“Just open up and we can settle this inside,” Anakin said and had a new layer of force in his voice. Obi-Wan knew what that voice meant; he would get into the house any means necessary.

The man hesitated, then removed the chain and let them in. The shameful look on his face told them he didn’t only know about the stars, he hoarded them.

“Well, _Steve_ , do you know the penalty for drug possession?” Anakin asked, already stepping up to the bad cop role.

“I didn’t want to, I promise. They came in here and pointed a gun at my head, I had no choice,” the man said, looking seconds away from crying.

“It’s alright, Steve,” Obi-Wan said and carefully placed a hand on his shoulder. “We understand. Just tell us who they were, and we will leave you alone.”

“I can’t rat them out; they will kill me for sure if I do,” the man sniffled.

Obi-Wan glanced at the doorframe that led to the kitchen. The half-circle had been painted over, but it was still faintly visible.

“They won’t know it was you. We can protect you,” Obi-Wan promised. The man glanced at Anakin.

“Or,” Anakin started, “we can make a big show out of your arrest and they will silence you before you even have a chance to rat them out.”

“Okay, okay, I’ll tell you!”

Obi-Wan and Anakin exchanged a triumphant gaze. They led the man to his kitchen table and sat down across from him.

“Now, tell us everything you know,” Obi-Wan told the man.

“It was an elderly man and a younger woman. They came here and demanded that I’d have a supply of their drugs,” the man said.

“Do you have any names, phone numbers?”

“No. They used to come here every now and then, give me more stuff to sell to the druggies and take the money. They never said when they would come, they just… showed up.”

“Alright, thank you.”

 

* * *

 

The drive back to the station was silent. Both he and Obi-Wan were in deep thoughts, trying to figure out what to do next.

“What should we do?” He asked after half an hour.

“I think the best course of action would be to find some more crack houses, go undercover and try to find more moons, then watch the house until the man and woman turns up,” Obi-Wan said.

“Yeah, sounds good.” Anakin saw a diner at the side of the road and his stomach reminded him that he hadn’t eaten anything since breakfast. He parked the car.

“Time for dinner,” he told Obi-Wan.

They sat across from each other in a small booth. Anakin was always grateful that detectives worked in plain clothes; if they had worn uniforms, people would be staring at them throughout the meal, wondering what they were doing here. Some of the bikers that were currently gulfing down food as if they hadn’t eaten for days would probably feel pressured to leave, or to mess with them.

Anakin and Obi-Wan ordered the same meal; bacon and eggs with fried potatoes and salad on the side. They ate in a comfortable silence. Anakin looked up every so often to just watch Obi-Wan eat. It was a funny little show. Obi-Wan’s table manners were impeccable; he ate the same way Anakin’s grandmother did. Napkin in lap, elbows off the table, fork in the left hand, knife in the right. He cut the food in small pieces before bringing one piece of each food together on the backside of the fork, then he scooped the food into his mouth and chewed and swallowed before the process started again. Sometimes Anakin wondered if he’d always been this proper, or if he too had wolfed down everything edible in sight when he was a teenager.

Anakin had first met Obi-Wan when he was just about to turn ten. Obi-Wan had been twenty-five at the time, and his teenage years lay behind him. Anakin had seen some photos from that time, but Obi-Wan hadn’t told him much. He always seemed to quieten when they breached the subject.

“Are you gonna eat or just stare at me?” Obi-Wan asked between bites.

“I don’t know, you look a lot more appetizing than my food at the moment,” Anakin said with a grin. He saw the corners of Obi-Wan’s mouth twitch as well.

“Always the charmer.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for the great feedback I've received :D especially thanks to dyingsighs, who keeps drawing [adorable fanart](http://dyingsighs.tumblr.com/post/106978343954/anakin-and-obi-wan-true-detective-au-2-2) :3  
> Again, I'm not from the U.S., but I've done a lot of research to make this as "realistic" as possible. Any mistakes are on me.  
> Enjoy!

They decided to let Anakin go undercover, since it was easier to make him look like a junkie than Obi-Wan. Other cops volunteered to go undercover in his place, but they wanted to keep the operation as minimal as possible. Most of this case had involved just the two of them.

Anakin was dressed in ripped jeans and an old leather jacket that smelled like tobacco. He didn’t know who the jacket belonged to. The band t-shirt he wore was something that he’d fished out of his own laundry basket. He needed to look shabby. The makeup artist had even sprinkled a small amount of olive oil in his hair so that it’d look greasy and unwashed. His skin had also been powdered to imitate the yellow look that most junkies had, and his eyes had been made to look red and bloodshot. It was truly amazing what someone could do with a palette of makeup.

When he looked in the mirror he saw a junkie, much like the ones he’d hauled into holding cells and interrogation rooms over the years. It was a look that both intrigued and repulsed him.

 “You sure you want to do this?” Obi-Wan asked him lowly, looking deep into his eyes when he’d parked the car at the end of the street.

“It’s not like I’m going into war, Obi-Wan,” he answered.

“I just don’t want you to feel forced to do anything you don’t want to.”

“I’m fine,” Anakin assured him. Obi-Wan nodded, but the crease in his forehead told Anakin that he still worried.

“Okay. Just remember to look like them. No peacocking,” Obi-Wan reminded him.

“I don’t peacock.”

“You know what I mean; don’t go in there and fill the room,” Obi-Wan said.

“You say that as if you don’t do it yourself,” Anakin remarked.

“I’m not the one going undercover in a crack house.”

Anakin had never gone undercover before. He felt a bit nervous, but also sure that he could do it. His mission wasn’t difficult; just to blend in and look for half-circles, or “moons” like Obi-Wan had taken to calling them.

He was walking in there without his gun or badge, without even an earpiece to keep him in contact with Obi-Wan. All he had was his cellphone tucked into his pocket.

With determined steps, he entered the house. Obi-Wan's words echoed in his head and he immediately let his proud figure deflate.

No one paid him any mind. They were all busy with lying on mattresses and sitting in chairs, eyes staring at nothing but the illusion inside of their heads. Some even lay on the floor. Their eyes looked empty, reflecting the hollowness inside of them. All dreams and ambitions lost. They were pathetic in their constant quest for the next high, for the relief, for the escape. He felt sorry for them.

Anakin walked through the house, inspecting every doorframe, table and cupboard. There were no half-circles to be found.

When he came back to the living room, where most people resided, he saw a woman selling coke to a boy that didn’t look old enough to not be in school right now. Anakin carefully walked up to her.

"Hey," he said, "you got any stars?" He studied the woman's face, waiting for some sign that she recognized his request.

"What the hell are you on about, boy?" She asked, her shrill voice cutting through his ears.

"Stars," he said again. The woman looked just as puzzled as before.

"You mean crystal?" She obviously had no idea what he was looking for.

"No, never mind…" he said, cast his eyes down and started walking towards the front door. This house held nothing but the usual.

A hand on his arm stopped him. It was the young boy he'd seen buying coke.

"Heard you were looking for stars," he stated, looking Anakin up and down.

"I am," Anakin admitted.

"Why? That shit's expensive as fuck."

"Yeah, but nothing compares," Anakin said with a shrug. "My friend hooked me up with some, but I don't know where to get it."

"What are you looking to buy?" The boy asked. As they'd suspected; 'stars' was an umbrella term for all of Sidious' drugs.

"Just some H."

"Hm…" the boy pursed his lips, thinking. "I think you'd get it easiest at Steve's. Lives about two hours from here."

"Haven't you heard? Steve got busted by the cops," Anakin said, trying his best to sound dramatic.

"What? When?" The boy asked.

"Just a couple of weeks ago."

"Damn… you think they're on to the something?" The boy looked particularly worried at that.

"Nah, they didn't even notice the moon," Anakin said. He improvised the whole conversation, but the boy didn't seem to notice.

"The fuckers are stupid. I can't believe our tax money goes to them." The boy looked too young to even pay taxes, but he shook his head in disapproval all the same.

"Yeah… know some other place?" This boy seemed to know what was up.

"Bongo, I guess, though they're a bit more tightfisted." The boy leaned over and clamped down a hand on Anakin's shoulder. "Just say that Nick sent you and they should loosen up."

When Anakin emerged from the house, he quickly looked around to see if anyone was around, then he stalked towards Obi-Wan's car.

“What did you find out?” Obi-Wan asked as he seated himself in the passenger seat.

“There’s nothing in here, but there is a bar called Bongo a town over where they supposedly have all the good stuff,” Anakin filled him in.

“Let’s check it out.”

 

* * *

 

For three days they lay in wait, watching the bar. Obi-Wan and Anakin let other cops keep watch too, but they could hardly relax and drop it on their time off. It was by pure coincidence that they were the ones keeping watch when the woman and the elderly man arrived. At first, Obi-Wan didn’t see that it was a woman, but Anakin’s keen eyes caught on when the pair were close to slip through their fingers.

“Wait,” Anakin had said, focusing his eyes on them. “That’s a woman; her head is just shaved.”

They waited until the woman and the old man came out of the bar again and drove away, then they tailed them.

“I can’t believe we almost missed her,” Anakin said, unwilling to let the subject go. “How often do you think someone passes under our radar because we’re caught up in stereotypical gender roles?”

“I don’t know,” Obi-Wan said. “There’s this theory that while statistic shows that more killers are men, they’re really equal in numbers, just that the women don’t get caught since they know how to pass below the radar.”

“It wouldn’t surprise me.” Anakin shook his head. The sun shone through the window and made his hair look like a golden halo. Obi-Wan forgot to look at the road for a moment.

“Let’s just focus on bringing them in.”

They had an arrest warrant for the unnamed man and woman, so they were just waiting for the right moment to move in. The right moments presented itself fairly quickly; the man and the woman parked their car near a rather small ramshackle house. With the way the older man walked – straight-backed and unhurried with his head held high – Obi-Wan would’ve guessed he didn’t live there. The woman was a safer bet.

Obi-Wan and Anakin watched as they entered the house, waited a few heartbeats, then exited the car in synch.

“You think anyone else is in there? We don’t want to walk in on a drug nest filled with guns,” Anakin said and unholstered his handgun.

“She unlocked the door, so unless they have someone captured in there I’d guess they’re alone. Look at this place; it’s not very isolated. People would’ve reported a gang messing around here,” Obi-Wan said.

Still, they spied through the windows. The woman and the man were in a heated argument, but they didn’t hear about what. Obi-Wan motioned for Anakin to move in. Anakin opened the door and walked inside. Obi-Wan followed with his gun raised.

“Police! Freeze!” Anakin yelled, and the woman and the man stared at them like deer in headlights for a second before bolting upstairs. Anakin and Obi-Wan rushed after.

“Let’s split up,” Obi-Wan said as he ran down the hallway where the woman had disappeared. Anakin started to clear the other rooms.

A door slammed. It must’ve been her. Obi-Wan advanced, but found that the door was locked. He pushed his shoulder against it with all his weight behind, but it didn’t budge. He kicked at the lock a few times, then he tried again. This time it worked; the door opened before him. The room inside was empty though. He looked around for some other door, but found none. It was by pure chance that he glanced out the window, and that’s when he saw her; she was climbing down the fire escape. She had almost reached the ground. He could climb after her and then start a wild-goose chase.

“Ah, fuck it,” he whispered to himself before taking a few steps back, then ran towards the window and threw himself through it. _The house isn’t even that tall,_ he thought to himself, somewhat panicked, as he fell through the air.

He half-landed on the woman and dragged her to the ground with him. He could barely breathe, but still managed to climb on top of her and hold her down with his greater weight. She struggled fruitlessly against him.

“State police,” Obi-Wan wheezed, grabbing his handcuffs. “You’re under arrest for distribution and possession of illegal drugs. You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to talk to an attorney and have him or her present with you while you are being questioned. If you cannot afford one, one will be appointed for you. You can decide at any time to exercise these rights. Do you understand each of these rights as I have explained them to you?” He secured the cuffs around her wrist and she stopped struggling. She knew better.

“Obi-Wan?!” Anakin’s voice suddenly sounded. Obi-Wan turned to see him walking towards them with a bloodied nose. His eyes zeroed in on Obi-Wan, taking in the cuts that covered every bare patch of skin. “Are you alright?” He asked.

“Yeah, I’m fine. I think my shoulder is dislocated though,” Obi-Wan said. He saw how Anakin’s expression turned from worry to sour irritation.

 

* * *

 

Anakin was still sulking about it half an hour later as they were driving towards the station with the woman and a large amount of drugs in the back. The old man had managed to escape after punching Anakin in the face. He looked like an angry snail where he sat behind the steering wheel, with wads of paper sticking out of his nostrils and an annoyed pout on his mouth.

“I cannot believe you,” Anakin said after a while. Obi-Wan didn’t answer; he was busy nursing his arm that had a pretty deep gash across it that oozed blood. “You always go on and on about me being reckless and having to be more careful, and then you pull shit like this.”

“Anakin, it was a split-second decision, it’s not like I thought it through,” Obi-Wan said with a sigh.

“You would think that most people had in programmed in them _not_ to throw themselves out from a window,” Anakin shot back.

“I don’t see why you’re so worked up about this. If I hadn’t done what I did, we wouldn’t have caught her,” Obi-Wan said and pointed a thumb in the woman’s direction.

“It’s not about that,” Anakin said through gritted teeth.

“Then what is it about?”

“It’s about you preaching to me to be careful and then won’t be careful yourself. It’s hypocritical,” Anakin explained.

“The difference is that you are careless all the time. Just three months ago you ran after an armed murderer without backup, and last year you cleared an area under bomb threat without any idea of what you were doing.” Obi-Wan had since long ago learned that Anakin had no problem pulling off impossible and dangerous tasks in order to secure a case, but that didn’t mean that he wouldn’t scold him every time, hero complex be damned.

“You only think it’s different because it’s you instead of me,” Anakin said.

They were silent after that. Obi-Wan turned towards the woman in the backseat.

“What’s your name?” He asked. The woman just glared at him. She had a tattoo on either corner of her mouth that stretched down and met under her chin. It made her look extra grumpy.

“Suit yourself,” Obi-Wan said. “Are you hurt?”

The woman continued to just glare.

“Can you just tell us if we need to call in a medic?” Obi-Wan asked.

“You don’t. I’m fine.” The woman’s voice was eerily deep and low.

“Good.” Obi-Wan turned back to staring at the road through the windshield.

“We’re gonna call in a medic anyway,” Anakin told him without looking at him.

“There’s no need; Kit will fix my arm,” Obi-Wan argued.

“We don’t know if you have any other injuries. I’m not gonna have you drop dead because you have latrophobia,” he said.

“I don’t have latrophobia.”

“Yes you do.”

Obi-Wan saw the woman rolling her eyes in the rearview mirror.

 

* * *

 

“What happened to you?” Ahsoka asked when they arrived at the station, both with blood-stained clothes.

“Obi-Wan jumped out of a window,” Anakin said.

“Anakin got punched in the face,” Obi-Wan said.

“You want me to fetch the first aid for you?” Ahsoka asked, looking between them.

“Yes,” Obi-Wan said at the same time that Anakin said “no, call a medic.”

“Just tell me where Kit is, will you?” Obi-Wan said.

“I think he’s in his office,” Ahsoka said.

Obi-Wan turned to Anakin. He looked a little less angry now.

“Can you take it from here?”

“Yes, go,” Anakin said.

 

Obi-Wan left Anakin and the woman in order to find Officer Fisto. Like Ahsoka had said, he was sitting behind his desk, reading a report.

“What happened to you?” He asked when Obi-Wan entered after knocking gently at the doorframe.

“I jumped out of a window. Can you fix my shoulder?”

“No problem,” Officer Fisto said and stood up. Obi-Wan braced himself for the pain. Officer Fisto had fixed Qui-Gon’s arm once, and he had bit his lip hard enough to draw blood.

Obi-Wan didn’t bite through his lip, but he did groan loudly.

“God…” he said afterwards, moving his shoulder in gentle circles.

“You are dripping blood on my floor,” Officer Fisto remarked. Obi-Wan looked; the cut on his forearm had bled through the paper towels he had covered it with and his shirt. “You might need stiches for that.”

“Thanks for the help,” Obi-Wan said and left the office. He located a first aid kit and washed and bandaged his arm carefully. It was deep, but would hardly need stitching. The cuts on his face and other arm were shallow and would heal on their own, so he rolled up his sleeves and went to find Anakin.

He found him outside of one of the interrogation rooms. The paper was gone from his nose now, but it still looked a little swollen.

“You alright?” He asked when Obi-Wan approached.

“Yes, don’t worry. What have you got on the woman?”

“We’ve IDed her as Asajj Ventress. Twenty-six years old, closest relatives are five sisters and three brothers,” Anakin told him, handing him a file.

“That’s… a lot,” Obi-Wan commented.

“Yeah. Apparently they raised her,” Anakin said.

Obi-Wan looked through the pane of glass separating them. The woman was sitting at a table, stubbornly staring straight ahead at the wall.

“Ready to talk to her?” Obi-Wan asked.

“After you,” Anakin answered, gesturing toward the door.

They entered the room and sat down across from her.

“Nice bandage,” she said to Obi-Wan.

“Thank you. Looks a bit heroic, doesn’t it?” Obi-Wan asked and held up his bandaged arm. The woman just smiled in return. It wasn’t a pretty smile; had Obi-Wan met her in a dark alleyway with that smile on her face, he would’ve feared for his life.

“You ready to talk?” Anakin asked. The woman turned her eyes to him and the smile faltered immediately. She leaned back in her chair.

“I want my phone call.”

 

* * *

 

They had expected the woman to call the old man, or maybe even the mysterious Sidious, but when they tracked the call it led to some hotshot lawyer named Talzin. After the phone call, the woman had refused to speak a word with either of them. By the time they had put her in a cell to sleep in over the night, it was late and there wasn’t much to do but go home.

“Are you coming over tonight?” Obi-Wan asked Anakin. After tough days like this one, he liked company, especially Anakin’s.

“No, I’m heading home. I need a good night’s rest, and your couch isn’t that comfortable,” Anakin said. There was an edge to his words that Obi-Wan choose to ignore.

“Okay. See you tomorrow.”

Maybe it was good that Anakin wouldn’t come over; they often ended up talking half the night or watching movies until the late hours. Obi-Wan needed a good night’s rest too.

With heavy footsteps he walked up the stairs to his apartment, unlocked the door, took off his shoes and coat. He was desperate for a shower; he smelled like blood.

But something was wrong; he felt it in the air. If someone had asked him to describe it, he hadn’t been able to. Call it intuition, a sixth sense, whatever. So he started walking through the apartment with cautious steps, clearing room after room. It was when he entered the living room that he understood that he’d been right.

Big, capital letters covered the wall. One word was spelled out with black paint; _MURDERER_.


	3. Chapter 3

The next day, Anakin was looking forward to seeing Obi-Wan. Even if their bickering often tipped over to arguing, they rarely parted on bad terms. Something always pushed them together; a case, a joke, or a silent apology represented by a cup of coffee. Things had still been tense between them when they went their separate ways last night, and it made Anakin uncomfortable.

When he arrived at their desks there was no sign of Obi-Wan. The older man always arrived first, with few exceptions. Anakin didn't think much of it though, and went to the kitchenette to make some coffee for both of them. He expected to see Obi-Wan at his desk when he returned, bent over a pile of papers, but the desk chair was still empty.

An hour later, Obi-Wan's coffee had since long turned cold and he was conspicuous by his absence. Anakin was working, but his mind were elsewhere, namely on Obi-Wan's whereabouts. It wouldn't be surprising if Obi-Wan had overslept after the hectic events of yesterday, but Anakin had called him three times and only reached his voicemail.

"Skywalker!" Anakin flinched as Captain Windu's powerful voice boomed unexpectedly next to his ear.

"What?"

"Where's Kenobi?" Captain Windu looked between Obi-Wan's empty seat and Anakin. He wasn't used to seeing one without the other.

"I don't know. He hasn't arrived yet," Anakin said. Captain Windu glanced at his watch.

"We had a meeting scheduled for half an hour ago," Captain Windu said.

"I'll go and see what's become of him," Anakin decided and stood up, grabbing his coat and car keys in the motion.

 _Something's wrong_ , he thought during the drive over to Obi-Wan's apartment. The feeling had been resting in his gut all morning, and now it grew.

He forced himself to walk up the stairs instead of running.

Never had he been happier to have a spare key to Obi-Wan's apartment; if he'd been forced to stay outside and continuously knock on the door without receiving an answer, he'd gone mad.

Now, he just walked right in. Obi-Wan's shoes and coat were there, he noted, so maybe he was overreacting. Maybe Obi-Wan was asleep and his phone was dead.

"Obi-Wan?" He called out, walking further into the apartment. Obi-Wan hated it when Anakin didn't take off his shoes at the door – probably had something to do with Obi-Wan originally being European – and would probably strangle him once he saw the trail of muddy footsteps that Anakin left behind.

"Come on, old man, don't try to–" Anakin cut himself off as he reached the living room.

The place was a mess. Furniture lay overturned on the floor together with shards of smashed glass. But what really caught his eye was the word _MURDERER_ that had been scrawled on the wall in big letters.

It felt as if a hand of ice had gripped his heart and was squeezing, hard. Quickly, he checked every room, but the apartment was empty. He called Captain Windu.

"Captain, I'm gonna need some backup here immediately," he told the captain. He looked down and saw rust-colored dots on the floor. Dried blood, no doubt. "Send a forensics team as well."

 

* * *

 

Obi-Wan woke up slowly, but he felt the pain immediately. His head was pulsating, aching, probably bleeding.

A man had been waiting for him when he came home, he remembered. It had all happened so fast. One second he was staring at the word written on his wall, the next the man had showed up behind him and hit him in the head. He'd fought with all he had, and for a moment it had seemed like he had the upper hand. Then the man had grabbed a glass vase from the coffee table and smashed it over his head. The world had disappeared from him, and he'd floated in darkness ever since.

Obi-Wan blinked a few times; either he was blind, or he was in a very dark room. He tried to move his body, but he was tied to a chair. He couldn't do much but flex his fingers against the armrests. The rope was bound tight around his wrists, ankles and midsection, trapping him completely.

Without being able to see or touch, Obi-Wan had to determine his surroundings using smell and hearing. The air smelled stale and a little damp, and judging by the cold and the silence, he'd say he was in a basement.

Obi-Wan sighed. He hadn't gotten a very good look on the man, but there was only one person who'd endlessly accuse him of murder. Still, he had never expected that person to do anything like this.

Minutes or hours later – there was no way to tell the time – a door opened in front of him. The small amount of light that shone in on him was blinding. The man stepped into the room and flicked on a bright fluorescent lamp in the ceiling. Obi-Wan's eyes burned enough to water, but there wasn't much to do but close them and turn his head down.

"Obi-Wan Kenobi." The voice was filled with conflicting emotions, both smug and displeased.

"Vox Chun," Obi-Wan replied and forced himself to look up at the man standing before him. Vox Chun looked much like he remembered, except for the wrinkles and that the previously blonde hair now was white.

"So you remembered." He sounded pleased.

"Of course." How could he ever forget?

"Do you know why you're here?" Vox asked. Apparently he wanted to play games before cutting to the chase. Obi-Wan would go along; the more playing, the less flaying, so to speak.

"If the dramatic message you left on my wall is any indication, then yes, I know why I'm here," Obi-Wan said.

"Tell me," Vox urged. He sounded like a teacher, or a parent. It was unnerving.

"You want revenge," Obi-Wan said.

"No, Obi-Wan. Not revenge. Justice. I will carry out the punishment you escaped years ago."

There was madness in his eyes; the sort of madness that built up slowly and festered your soul.

For the first time since this ordeal started, Obi-Wan felt the tingles of fear in his heart.

 

* * *

 

Captain Windu and Anakin had interviewed all Obi-Wan's neighbors, all but the one that lived across from Obi-Wan; she wasn't home. They were just about to go back into Obi-Wan's apartment where the forensics team was working when they saw her carrying a bag of groceries up the stairs.

"Excuse me, ma'am," Anakin called to her.

"Yes?" She asked, pausing outside of her door.

"We'd like to ask you some questions, if that's alright?" He flashed his badge.

"Sure, come with," she said and walked into her apartment. Anakin and Captain Windu followed.

They sat down at the kitchen table, watching as she started to unpack the groceries.

"Is it okay if I multitask, or do you want me to sit down?" She asked.

"Sit down, please," Captain Windu said. She sat down across from them.

"What's your name?" Anakin asked.

"Heather Tyler," she said.

"Heather, your neighbor Obi-Wan has been kidnapped," Captain Windu explained. Heather's eyes widened.

"Did you notice anything unusual yesterday?" Anakin asked, expecting another no. He received something else though.

"No, not at all. Or, well, there is one thing that I thought of, but I don't think it qualifies…" she trailed off.

"Tell us," Captain Windu said. Heather's eyes flickered over to him for a moment before returning to Anakin.

"I just thought it was strange that you came much earlier than usual," she told Anakin.

"Excuse me?" He answered.

"You usually come in later, and leave in the morning." She shrugged casually. "I just thought it was strange, is all."

"I wasn't here yesterday."

"Yes, you were; I saw you," Heather said with a frown.

Anakin and Captain Windu exchanged a look. They might have a witness.

"What time did you see this person you thought was me?" Anakin asked.

"Around five-ish, I think. The building is usually quiet until at least seven, so when I heard someone walking up the stairs I looked through my peephole and saw you. Or at least I thought it was you," Heather explained.

"Why would you think it was me?" Anakin questioned.

"You're always here." She shrugged again. "And you have a spare key, so I assumed it was you when he walked right in."

"Why do you know that?"

"I'm sick. I'm tied to my apartment; the furthest I have been in three years is the grocery store, and it's only five hundred meters away. It's a boring life, so I… notice things." Heather looked ashamed, and a blush had settled across her face.

"You mean you spy on your neighbors?" Anakin clarified.

"Yes." Her blush deepened.

"Let's get back on track here," Captain Windu said with force in his voice. "Can you describe the man?"

Heather could; he'd been tall, worn a black coat similar to Anakin's and a black beanie had covered his head. But that's all.

They thanked her and headed back towards Obi-Wan's apartment, but the captain's hand on his shoulder stopped him.

"Anakin, I need to ask you this; what exactly is your relationship to Obi-Wan?" He asked, staring Anakin down.

Anakin sighed. He'd known that Heather's words would bring such a reaction. She made it sound like Anakin only came to stay the night like a lover.

"I know what it sounded like in there, but we're just friends," he said. The captain didn't look convinced.

"Will you be able to lead this search or should I call in someone else?" Captain Windu asked. He was always hesitant to let any cop work on cases that would affect them personally.

"No, I can handle it," Anakin assured him, a little too quickly.

"Good." Captain Windu nodded.

When they stepped into Obi-Wan's apartment again, most of the forensics team had left, but someone else had arrived.

"Ahsoka?" Anakin said when he saw a familiar figure in the kitchen.

"Hey. I'm here to help," she explained. She pointed at a phone that was charging in a corner. "I found Kenobi's phone in his coat pocket. It was dead, but I'm charging it. I'm not sure if we'll be able to access it though."

"I know the PIN code," Anakin said.

"Great." Ahsoka's small smile fell away. "How are you holding up?"

"I'm fine, I just want to find Obi-Wan. We've interviewed his neighbors, and one saw the man who took him," Anakin filled her in.

A loud ring signal suddenly sounded through the room, and Captain Windu excused himself and left the room to answer.

"You think Sidious is behind this?" Ahsoka asked.

"No, this is personal. You saw the wall; someone wants revenge," Anakin answered. Who'd ever accuse _Obi-Wan_ of murder though? It was absurd. Still, he'd been there when Obi-Wan had shot someone, and he knew that Obi-Wan had killed others during his years together with Qui-Gon, but it had been his duty. Who'd want revenge for them?

"But who?" Ahsoka asked, sounding as confused as Anakin felt.

"He has shot people before. On duty, of course. Perhaps it's a friend or a family member," Anakin suggested.

"Excuse me," Captain Windu said as he strode into the room. "I have to leave. There's been a robbery, and at least a dozen people are being held hostage. I must oversee it."

"Yes, of course," Anakin said.

"But might I suggest looking through Obi-Wan's things and try to find a clue as to who took him? I think you should do it," he told Anakin, who nodded.

"You going back to the station?" Ahsoka asked the captain.

"Only briefly."

"I'm coming with." She turned to Anakin. "I'll look through the case files of the people Obi-Wan has shot, see if I can find anything."

 

The first thing Anakin decided to look through after the others had left was Obi-Wan's phone, but it offered nothing. He walked into Obi-Wan's bedroom and looked at the large chiffonier that stood pushed up against the wall. With all its drawers, it was bound to hold personal information somewhere.

Anakin took a deep breath and opened the first drawer.

 

* * *

 

"If you want me dead, why not just do it?" Obi-Wan asked. This was good; if Obi-Wan could get Vox to converse long enough, then maybe Anakin and the others would have time to save him. His mind was all that he had to defend himself with, being tied down like this.

"I don't _only_ want you dead," Vox said. His expression turned stern. "I want a confession."

"I have nothing to confess," Obi-Wan said.

"Oh, but you do. You know you do. You might've fooled everyone else, but not me." It sounded like a mantra, like something he'd convinced himself over the years.

"I didn't kill your son," Obi-Wan insisted.

"Yes you did." Vox clenched his jaw, probably biting back the rage Obi-Wan saw trapped in his eyes.

"It was an accident." Obi-Wan heard himself repeating the words that he'd said over twenty years ago in a courtroom. "He fell–"

"You pushed him!" Vox yelled, unable to contain his anger.

"No." That earned him a slap. It was sloppy and misaimed, so it only hurt a little. It seemed to have calmed down Vox slightly, though.

"It's alright; I've got plenty of time to break you." He huffed and straightened up. "There's nothing tying me to this place. Your cop buddies won't find us."

Obi-Wan swallowed. So the chances that he'd be found was decreasing.

"Why would I give you a false confession if you’ll only kill me afterwards?" Obi-Wan asked, trying to stay on the subject.

"Because by the time I'm through with you, you will beg me to kill you." The words sounded rehearsed, like he didn't really mean them. Maybe he didn't; maybe his rage and hatred for Obi-Wan was just a misguided projection of his grief.

"I'll leave you alone tonight, to let you recall your memories," Vox continued. He reached towards his belt and unsheathed a knife that Obi-Wan had taken note of earlier. It was a little rusty, and Obi-Wan suddenly felt very thankful for his tetanus shots.

"Maybe this will motivate you," Vox said and stabbed through Obi-Wan's hand with the knife. Obi-Wan couldn't stop the cry that escaped him. Vox turned off the lights and left him in darkness with the knife and the pain as his only company.

 

* * *

 

It felt wrong to go through Obi-Wan's stuff without his consent, but it was a necessity. Much of what Anakin found in Obi-Wan's drawers were uninteresting; papers from the bank, a half-used check-book, a bunch of receipts held together by a paperclip, etc. Everything neatly sorted. But every now and then he found something more personal; a diploma Obi-Wan had received for being the fastest track runner in 9th grade. An earring, which confused Anakin at first until he found a couple of photos of a 15 year-ish Obi-Wan and his friends, with the earring dangling from his earlobe. Huh. He also found a small, dark rock that was smooth like velvet to the touch.

Despite having known Obi-Wan for the greater part of his life and, quite frankly, knowing the man from the inside and out, Anakin had learned more about Obi-Wan's early years than he'd done in the 13 years they'd been friends.

It all surprised him; he'd never considered Obi-Wan to be a nostalgic person. His friend had on numerous occasions talked about letting go, especially of material things, to make life “simpler but richer”. Anakin had never shared that philosophy; possessions were a testament to where you’d been; an old, much too small, t-shirt with Mickey Mouse on it held precious memories from his childhood, and he had a tendency to save receipts and movie tickets.

Anakin couldn't stop the smile that spread over his face – the first one in what felt like forever – when he found a photo of a young but grown up Obi-Wan seated on a motorcycle. Obi-Wan was grinning widely and held a helmet under his arm. Anakin remembered that motorcycle, and he remembered riding it with his arms securely twined around Obi-Wan's waist. How devastated he'd been when Obi-Wan sold it.

His only expectation had been to find a photo of Qui-Gon, but he didn't. That was also a surprise, but he supposed that Obi-Wan didn't need photos to remember his former partner and father figure. Anakin didn't often ask Obi-Wan about his and Qui-Gon's relationship; it felt too personal, almost sacred.

He was in the middle of reading through an old letter from Obi-Wan's brother (congratulating him on his graduation from the police academy and asking if he could come visit) when his cellphone rang.

"Yeah?" He asked as a greeting.

"Hey," it was Ahsoka's soft voice, "how's it going?"

"I haven't gone through everything yet, but I doubt I'll find anything. There are mostly old photos and bank papers," he said. _This is all I will have left of him_. Anakin pushed the thought aside.

"I think you should come down here," Ahsoka said.

"Why, what did you find?" Anakin's heart immediately picked up a pace.

"Well, it's more about what I didn't find," Ahsoka started. "I looked through the files of the people he shot, but found nothing, so I moved on to Obi-Wan's own file, and…"

"What is it?" Anakin prompted.

"His records are sealed."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> School has started, so I won't be able to update as frequently. I'll try though :)


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry it took me a year to update. I have no excuse. If there are any details I'm missing or forgetting, I apologise. I haven't, like I said, written for this story in a long time and it will take a little time to gather all the pieces again.

Anakin paced back and forth in the room he and Ahsoka had been given at the station. In a file on the table was everything that the forensics team had discovered in Obi-Wan's apartment, but the clues was sparse. It didn't matter; the key to this case was locked away in Obi-Wan's sealed records, Anakin was sure of it.

"We've been able to access his finances, account activity and health papers. Basically everything is available for us, except for his personal records between the years 1988 and 1991," Ahsoka said. "Nothing's out of the ordinary."

"88 to 91, those specific years?" Anakin double-checked. What on earth could've happened in those three years years that landed Obi-Wan with sealed records? Any why –  _ why  _ – hadn't he told Anakin about it?

"Yes. We'll be able to access them once we have a court order, but we won't get one until tomorrow."

Anakin stopped his pacing and glanced at his watch. It was just after midnight. A deep sigh escaped him.

"You should head home and rest," Ahsoka said softly.

"No." Anakin sat down across from her at the table. "I won't rest until I find Obi-Wan." He was fairly certain that he wouldn't  _ be able _ to rest until he found Obi-Wan.

"Alright, then we need more coffee," Ahsoka said and rose from her seat. Anakin watched as she left the room. He hadn't asked her to help, and he wouldn't have blamed her for going home to get a few hours of sleep (maybe just a little). Still, here she was; helping.

She came back a few minutes later with two steaming mugs. Anakin looked up from the evidence that he was inspecting for the umpteenth time and noted the dark circles under her eyes. He'd owe her for this.

"Thank you," he told her when she set down one of the mugs in front of him. He wondered if she realised that he was thanking for everything else as well.

“You’re welcome.”

A silence fell between them for a few moments.

“Have we notified his family?” Anakin asked.

“I tried, but I couldn’t reach them. I’ll try again in the morning.”

Maybe he should’ve been the one to notify Obi-Wan’s next of kin, seeing as he was Obi-Wan’s best friend and everything, but the thought hadn’t even occurred to him. He wasn’t sure if the rest of the Kenobis even knew he existed. He had never met them, and Obi-Wan wasn’t very close with them.

“You think they will know what all this is about?” Ahsoka asked, interrupting Anakin’s thoughts.

“Maybe, I don’t know. Obi-Wan attended a boarding school from the age of 12, so back in 1988 he wasn’t living at home. But with something serious enough to seal his records, I would assume his family knows.”

Anakin tried calling Obi-Wan’s parents himself, but they didn’t pick up, and he had equal luck with Obi-Wan’s brother.

Anakin put his face in his palms and rubbed his eyes. For every hour, every minute, every second that ticked by, Obi-Wan was more and more likely to not be found. Or be found dead. Anakin swallowed. He couldn’t let that happen.

“Come on,” he told Ahsoka as he stood up and grabbed his coat.

“Where are we going?” Ahsoka asked as she followed his lead, walking down the corridors with haste.

“We are going to find out why Obi-Wan’s records are sealed.”

“We still need a court order for that,” Ahsoka reminded him.

“There’s no time for that,” Anakin said. They walked through the station and to the garage where he had parked Obi-Wan’s car.

“What are you gonna do, break into City Hall?” Ahsoka asked him, eyebrow arched.

“No,” he turned and looked at her, “I’m gonna hack into the system.”

“That’s illegal,” she pointed out.

“Is that gonna be a problem?” 

Sure, he was supposed to uphold the law, but if breaking it meant that he could save Obi-Wan, then he really didn’t care.

“No,” she said and got in the car. Anakin followed suit. 

When he had started the car and started to back out of the garage, Ahsoka asked “Do you know how to?”

“How to do what?”

“Hack into the system.”

“No, but I know someone who do.”

“And who would that be?” Anakin kept his eyes focused on the road in front of him, so he didn’t see the sceptical look Ahsoka gave him.

“His name is Boba Fett. Officer Fisto busted him a couple of months ago for hacking the databank of a bank and transfer money to an offshore account,” Anakin filled her in.

“And he’s not in prison?”

“He’s fourteen.” 

Ahsoka was silent for almost a full minute.

“Wow…”

“Yeah.”

 

***

 

Obi-Wan had been awake all night because of the pain, but the blood loss had made him dizzy enough to barely notice when Vox entered the room. The light that filtered through from the crack under the door told him that it was morning. He was wounded, and hungry, and in desperate need of a toilet. He had worked on the roped he was tied with, but they hadn’t loosened one bit despite his wiggling. He was well and truly stuck.

“Kenobi,” Vox said, snapping his fingers in front of Obi-Wan. Obi-Wan looked up at him, doing his best to glare, but probably failed. “Are you ready to confess?”

“I have nothing to-”

Once again, he was cut off by a harsh slap to his face that made him spit blood onto the concrete floor.

“The way you’re going, you will kill me before you break me,” he commented.

“A few hits won’t kill you,” Vox replied.

“Blood loss might.”

Vox hummed a little and turned his attention to the knife that penetrated Obi-Wan’s hand. He flicked his fingers at the shaft, making Obi-Wan hiss.

“You’re thinking of this, I presume? Don’t worry, I’m not removing it yet. We’ve got time.”

Vox obviously intended to use his time wisely. Although he wasn’t an experienced torturer, he was creative. He mostly kept to Obi-Wan’s arms and hands, promising he’d remove his fingernails soon. Obi-Wan suspected that promise to be empty, but he did not yet know the extent of Vox’s newfound, bold madness.

Vox slapped him so hard that Obi-Wan entire body shifted and made the whole chair fall over. The impact of the floor rattled through him.

Obi-Wan wondered for a moment if he should beg Vox to stop, but he had a feeling it would only encourage him. Or that Vox would think he was breaking. Despite the pain, Obi-Wan wasn’t breaking; he knew who he was, what he had done, what had happened. He and Qui-Gon had cleared it up years and years ago.

So he decided to stay silent for as long as he could.

 

***

 

Anakin knocked on the Fetts’ door harder than necessary, but he was jittery and desperate.

Jango Fett opened the door dressed in a pyjamas and robe.

“Hello?”

“Good evening, Mr Fett. I’m Detective Skywalker and this is Officer Tano. We’re sorry for disturbing you so late, but we need your son’s help. It’s urgent.”

Jango squinted at their badges before opening the door wider to let them it.

They waited in the kitchen while Jango went to wake his son up. Anakin watched the arms of the clock on the wall move forward lazily.

Boba Fett was also dressed in a robe, but he didn’t seem to be wearing anything underneath. On his ankle, Anakin could see a monitor.

“What do you want?” He asked, voice tired.

“One of our men, Detective Kenobi, has been kidnapped and we need information. His records are sealed, and we don’t have time to wait for a court order. You need to hack the records for us,” Ahsoka explained.

“I can’t do that,” Boba said.

“What? You have to!” Anakin said.

“No, I don’t. And it’s illegal.”

“Something tells me you don’t care,” Anakin said with a pointed look at Boba’s ankle monitor.

“I don’t want to get in more trouble,” Boba insisted and Anakin felt red, hot rage fill him.

“Do you know what it’s like, hoping that your best friend is being tortured just so that he won’t be dead? Hm?! You either help us, or I’ll-”

“ _ Anakin _ ,” Ahsoka cut him off and glared at him.

Anakin closed his mouth and clenched his jaws until his teeth felt like they would fall out. Right, don’t threaten a little kid in front of his father.

Jango Fett was glaring at him too.

“Please,” Anakin said. “Perhaps we could help you with that thing.” He point at the ankle monitor.

Boba looked between Anakin and Ahsoka, and then he turned to his father. The two seemed to engage in a non-verbal conversation, then Boba turned back to them.

“Fine. But I’ll need coffee.”

 

Anakin followed Boba to his room while Jango showed Ahsoka how the coffee machine worked.

Boba had two computers, and apparently he needed both for the task.

It felt like they took an eternity to start up. Anakin jiggled his leg.

“You know, this is gonna take a while,” Boba said. “You might as well relax.”

“You think I can?” Anakin snapped.

Boba shrugged and plugged his ipod into his speakers. It didn’t take long until the room was filled with annoying synthpop. Anakin groaned.

“It helps me work,” Boba said. “Now, I’ll need all the details you can give me.”

Anakin told Boba Obi-Wan’s full name, date of birth, the years they are looking into, everything that he could think of that was relevant.

Ahsoka came with coffee for all of them, and while Boba worked, they both checked in with the station to see if they had found out anything else. Anakin tried calling Obi-Wan’s family again, but they still didn’t pick up.

He should’ve been out there with the patrol looking for Obi-Wan, but Captain Windu had told him to try to find out who instead. Anakin was fairly certain Windu didn’t mean for him to get a kid to break the law for him to do so, but all is fair in love and war. And this was a war, on Anakin as much as Obi-Wan. If he lost Obi-Wan, it would be like losing a limb. Like losing all his limbs.

He had never liked being separated from Obi-Wan; he didn’t only feel Obi-Wan’s absence, but also the absence of himself. It was like Obi-Wan was his soul, and to be separated from him forever would turn Anakin into an empty shell. Panic flared up in him when he touched that thought, and he wondered if Boba could work faster.

 

Just after two in the morning, Boba told them that he had successfully unsealed Obi-Wan’s file.

Anakin and Ahsoka joined him at the computer, both’s eyes skimming over the page, trying to make sense of the hidden years.

What they found was a surprise. In his early teens, Obi-Wan had been accused of the murder of a fellow student, Bruck Chun. They two had been on the roof of the school, where, according to Obi-Wan’s statement, they had wrestled and Bruck had lost his footing, fallen off the roof and died from the impact. Because of the absence of eye-witnesses and the many times Obi-Wan and Bruck had fought before, foul play was suspected.

Apparently, Qui-Gon Jinn had been head of the case, and later shown Obi-Wan support as Bruck’s father, Vox Chun, had appealed to the courts endlessly, taking the case further and further.

Obi-Wan had eventually won the case, and his file had been sealed to protect him.

 

“It has to be the father who’s behind this,” Anakin concluded.

“But why now?” Ahsoka asked.

“Does it matter? We need to find out where he could be holding Obi-Wan.”

Anakin thanked the Fetts for their cooperation and then he and Ahsoka headed back to the station. On the way there, Ahsoka called ahead to the technical analyst and told them to dig up everything they could on Vox Chun.

Anakin’s heart beat in a steady, quick rhythm, convinced that they were on the right track. It felt worse now than before; they know who was behind this, most likely, but they had no idea where the man was.

 

“Vox Chun lives in Oregon,” Anakin said, looking over the papers he’d been given the moment he walked into the station. “There’s no way he brought Obi-Wan all the way back there. With that message he left on the wall, he knew we’d be looking for him.”

“He must be somewhere close by. He might’ve rented something,” Ahsoka suggested.

“I think you’re right. He withdrew a lot of cash three months ago, and he’s probably paying with that to avoid being tracked.” Anakin wanted to bang his head against a wall. Where could he be?

“Okay, so we’ll look into all rentable places around that has been rented for tonight. We’ll start with the most desolate and private ones,” Ahsoka said and they once again retreated to the car.

The technical analyst sent them the addresses of all the buildings they’d need to visit.

While Anakin drove, Ahsoka looked through the papers.

“I think we just found out why Vox decided to do this now,” she told Anakin. “Vox had two sons; Bruck and Kad. Both are dead, but Kad’s date of death is stamped only five months ago. He has nothing left to live for, except revenge.”

 

***

 

“Please.”

The word slipped from Obi-Wan’s tongue before he could stop it.

“Obi-Wan, Obi-Wan… you know it’s easy to make this stop. There’s only one thing you need to do,” Vox told him, a smile in his voice.

Obi-Wan’s chair was once again upright, and Vox had done a number on him. Obi-Wan’s hand was numb, but still had the knife through it. Broken fingers stood up in unnatural angles, there were shallow risps all over his arms and face, he’d pissed himself, and his head, stomach, and ribs ached from repeated beatings.

“I won’t confess to anything,” Obi-Wan said.

Vox moved away from him and disappeared out of the door for a minute or two. Then he came back with an electric kettle. He plugged it into the socket in the corner, and Obi-Wan heard the water within starting to boil.

“Are you going to burn me?” He asked, even though he already knew the answer. 

Conversation was key.

“Yes. Unless you have something to tell me first,” Vox said, and the smile is gone from his tone. He’s getting impatient.

“I’ve told you. I didn’t kill Bruck. We were careless, and he fell. I would never push him.”

“Keep telling yourself that,” Vox scoffed.

“You need help. Let go of this, or it will ruin your life,” Obi-Wan said. 

It felt like he had repeated the same thing in a thousand different ways by now.

“It has already ruined my life!” Vox yelled in his face.

“What about Kad? Don’t you care about what this will do to him?” Obi-Wan tried.

That was apparently the wrong thing to say. Vox’s eyes spark with intense fury, with madness.

Vox ripped the knife out of Obi-Wan’s hand, and it hurt despite the dulled feeling.

“What about Kad? Kad is dead!” Vox’s voice boomed through the room, and he buried the knife deep into Obi-Wan’s shoulder.

He pulled the knife out, and blood gushed out of the wound. The pain was deep, deeper than any pain Obi-Wan had felt before. He welcomed the darkness that started to envelope him.

_‘So this is how I die’_ , he thought. He was filled with relief, but also sadness. He didn’t feel prepared to die already. He thought of Qui-Gon, of his family, of Anakin. He found himself regretting that he hadn’t indulged in his feelings for the younger man. Part of him had always thought there would be time. Now there wouldn’t be.

 

Suddenly, the door slammed open. Obi-Wan had trouble focusing, but after a moment he saw that it was Anakin and Ahsoka entering.

They said something. Anakin pointed his gun at Vox, who held up his hands, surrendering. Anakin said something more, and Ahsoka said something urgent.

Anakin said nothing, just continued pointing the gun at Vox. Obi-Wan wanted to say something, but he couldn’t.

“Anakin, don’t!” Ahsoka yelled, and then there was the deafening sound of a gunshot.


End file.
